Exploring the Planets a memoir / Fred Taylor (Halley Professor Physics (Emeritus), Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, UK).

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Taylor, F. W., author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Astrophysicists--England--Biography.

Astrophysicists.

Taylor, F. W.

England.

Genre:

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

xvii, 363 pages : illustrations (some color) ; 24 cm

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Oxford Oxford University Press, 2016.

Summary:

The planets fascinate us, and naturally we care about our own Earth, and things like how well we can forecast the weather and whether climate is really changing. Exploring the Planets offers a personal account on how the space programme evolved. It begins in the era of the first blurry views of our Earth as seen from space, and ends with current plans for sophisticated robots on places as near as our neighbours Venus and Mars and as far away as the rainy lakelands of Saturn's planet-sized moon Titan. Examining the scientific goals of these complex voyages of discovery, and the joys and hardships of working to achieve them. The Space Age is now about 50 years old and for those lucky enough to be part of it at its inception, it's filled a worklong lifetime. Today, several satellites around the Earth have studied the atmosphere and the climate using instruments on board that the author helped design and build. 'Deep space' missions were embarked upon to visit the planets: all of the major bodies (six planets, the Moon and minor bodies, asteroids and comets) of the classical Solar System have been scrutinised close-up by experiments built in various laboratories worldwide. Most of the narrative is based on the author's experiences at the world's space agencies, research labs, and conferences, and at other places as diverse as Cape Canaveral and No. 10 Downing Street.

Contents:

1 Prelude 1

The Cosmic Grand Tour 1

The Planets of the Solar System 2

Beginnings 4

School Days 7

University 12

A State Funeral 14

Jodrell Bank 14

Running the Bar 15

Looking for a Doctorate 18

A glimpse of the New World 22

2 Satellites and Spires 25

Parties and Pals 27

The Schoolmaster 29

Natural Philosophy 31

The Weather from Space 32

The Beryllium Spider 33

On the trail of the R-101 airship 36

Lift-off at Lark Hill 42

Aftermath 43

Finding a job 45

The New World beckons 47

3 The Gateway to the Planets 49

Wonderful Land 50

Mariner Jupiter-Saturn 53

Jupiter through a telescope 56

A Golden State 57

Et in Arcadia ego 60

Close Encounters 62

Coping with a failure 66

4 Voyage to Venus 68

Opportunity Knocks 68

Probing Venus's atmosphere 69

One of the Chosen Few 71

Stowaway to Venus 74

On to the launch 75

Launch and arrival 78

The mysterious Dipole 80

An early demise 81

Spreading the word 83

Trouble at t' mill 87

The first British hardware to go to another planet 88

Behind the Berlin Wall 89

Postscript 91

5 With Galileo to Jupiter 92

Destination Jupiter 93

Saving Galileo 95

The French Connection 96

Getting the instrument right 97

Jupiter and its mysteries 99

Problems 100

En route to Jupiter 104

Meeting the Giant 108

During the mission 109

Mission extensions 114

Anatomy of a success 115

Requiem 122

6 Back to Oxford 123

A call from the Old Country 124

Corning home 126

Back to Business 129

Head of Department 131

Admin and Teaching 134

Unification of Physics 135

We're all Europeans now 138

Physics and Politics 'down under' 138

In Marble Halls 141

Finlandia 143

7 Forecasting Weather and Climate 144

By Hooke or by crook 144

The Hooke Institute for Collaborative Atmospheric Research (1984-1992) 146

Half of me is ocean, half of me is sky 148

Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes 149

Growing like Topsy 151

Come one, come all 152

The Old Observatory saga 153

Trouble in Paradise 156

Exit Strategy 160

Requiescat in Pace 163

The New Sun also sets 163

8 The Ozone Layer and other Crises 166

Ten years to terror 166

Up UARS 167

Probing the stratosphere 168

Ozone depletion 170

Building a satellite instrument 171

Problems and reviews 173

Measuring pollution from space 174

Launch 178

Results 179

Tea with Mrs T 181

Bugs in space 182

Terror on the ground 182

A hole in the sky 186

The legacy 187

Hurdles and HIRDLS 189

9 Mishaps at Mars 191

A better way 191

Onward to Mars 192

Getting to Mars isn't easy 193

The US-European Joint Working Group 195

Mars Express and Beagle 2 198

Mars Observer 199

Mars Climate Orbiter: the first British hardware on Mars 201

Still California dreaming 204

10 Operation Saturn 206

If you can't beat them, join them 208

Orbiting Saturn 211

The Sirens of Titan 212

The Sword of Truth 214

Travelling the World 216

The Millennium Mission 220

11 The Days of the Comet 221

A Meeting in the Mountains 221

Comet Rendezvous and Sample Return 222

Rosetta 223

The VIRUS saga 225

Not so cool 226

Encounter with Lutetia 228

At the Comet at last 229

12 Return to the Silent Planet 234

Knocking on NASA's door 234

Why Venus? 235

A Venus shopping list 236

Europe offers hope 238

Going for broke 239

Love thy neighbouring planet as thyself 241

Venus Express takes shape 242

More on science goals 245

Viewing Venus 246

The Tempest 247

Global Wanning 251

Are volcanoes the culprits? 253

New Worlds for Old 254

Bringing Venus to Earth 255

Postscript: The Sky at Night, Discworld, and the Tardis 257

13 Marooned on Mercury 260

Mercury is the densest planet 260

Like the Moon but different 261

Ice in a furnace 265

Two new moons for Mercury 265

Science goals 267

The MISTERIE proposal 268

Rejection and redemption 271

14 Mars at last 273

Third time lucky 273

The Meteorology of Mars 274

Building intelligent models 278

What killed Beagle? 280

Was Mars warm and wet? 281

ExoMars goes West 288

ExoMars goes East 288

15 Ice on the Moon 290

The path less travelled 290

The Inconstant Moon 290

A ride to the Moon 293

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter 294

The plot thickens 297

16 A Beginner's Guide to the End of the World 299

The Climate Conundrum 300

Looking for answers 301

Playing a part 302

Education and outreach 306

Hard evidence 311

Taking action 312

The sleeping giant awakens 313

We're all Europeans now Part 2 313

Avoiding Armageddon 315

The transport internet 316

17 Standing at the edge of time 319

Moving On (a little) 321

Retirement and Redux 323

Emeritus 326

Back to Howick 329

Back to Liverpool 330

The Jesus Chair 332

The great and the good 334

Onward and upward 337

18 Epilogue 340

The Best Job in the World 342

Awards and inspiration 344

Valediction 348.

ISBN:

9780199671595

0199671591

OCLC:

933721845